In 1962, he faced Old Street magistrates court on charges of threatening behaviour, but successfully argued he was trying to protect his father who had been knocked down by a mob.

He used the same skills of persuasion back in June when he successfully won a confidence vote at the general council of the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile after weeks of successful lobbying.

The vote was forced on Mosley after the allegations in the News of the World. In this case, Mosley went after the News of the World - for breach of privacy rather than libel - because he said the publication of the articles had devastated his family.

In court, he candidly admitted to his involvement in the sadomasochistic scene, describing his predilection for corporal punishment as a "fantasy world" where the enjoyment was heightened by realistic roleplay. However, he said his sexual life should remain private and had nothing to do with his role as boss of formula one motor racing.

"My wife and I have been married for more than 48 years and together more than 50 years since we were teenagers and she never knew this aspect of my life," Mosley told the court. "That headline in the News of the World was completely and utterly devastating for her and there was nothing I could say."

He added that the situation was equally bad for his two sons, who were mortified by the pictures published in the News of the World.

Mosley also denied the News of the World's claims that the S&M roleplay had a Nazi theme, telling the high court: "I can think of few things more unerotic than Nazi roleplay.

"It also has associations for me in other ways which would make it even less interesting. All of my life I have had hanging over me my antecedents, my parents, and the last thing I want to do in some sexual context is to be reminded of it."

Mosley was referring to his father, Sir Oswald Mosley, who led the British Union of Fascists, and his mother, Diana Mitford, an admirer of Hitler. His parents were jailed as Nazi sympathisers in 1940 when Mosley was less than three months old. He and his older brother, Alexander, were cared for by relatives and later he went to school in Bavaria and England, followed by a degree in physics at Oxford.

After the war, Sir Oswald Mosley founded a new political party, the Union Movement, which advocated a united Europe. Mosley, along with his brother, was involved, painting the party's flash-and-circle symbol on walls in London on the night of the Soviet Union's invasion of Hungary in 1956, organising parties to attract young people to the movement, and canvassing for his father when he ran unsuccessfully for the Kensington North seat in 1959. Mosley was later an election agent for the Union Movement and in 1964 himself a prospective candidate.

In the early 1980s, Mosley worked for the Conservative party, but eventually abandoned hope of becoming a parliamentary candidate, claiming disillusionment with party officials and that his family name would be a handicap. He has since said: "If I had a completely open choice in my life, I would have chosen party politics, but because of my name, that's impossible."

Instead, Mosley looked to motorsports racing. He started as a spectator at university and then later, as a young barrister, started to race himself. He found a world where no one knew or cared about his father – instead they assumed he was related to Alf Mosley, the coach builder. He retired from racing in 1969 but remained involved, working his way up through the various sporting bodies. He has served as president of the FIA, which manages formula one, since 1993.

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